


Earthly Dust From Off Thee Shaken

by ExpectoPatronum



Series: When the Wind Blows [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Anxiety, Cuddling & Snuggling, Exactly What It Says on the Tin, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Insomnia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-29
Updated: 2018-08-29
Packaged: 2019-07-03 23:28:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15829122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ExpectoPatronum/pseuds/ExpectoPatronum
Summary: It had started with leaving his bedroom light on at night before he went to sleep. For a while, that had been enough.But then it wasn't.





	Earthly Dust From Off Thee Shaken

The worst thing about time-travel, in Peter’s opinion, was the way it made you feel. Not on the outside (if he'd thought about it, he might have expected an extreme form of jet-leg, but no such symptoms existed) but on the inside.

The doomed half of the universe had been restored without the slightest clue of what had befallen them, with the exception of those who had entered the world within the soul stone. Even the usually omniscient Dr. Strange had only been able to theorize as to why certain souls had been trapped within the stone while others had simply vanished; he’d postulated that only those souls which had already come into contact with an infinity stone were taken.

In theory, it should have made life simpler; the world’s population carried on as it always had, without the burden of remembered devastation. May had not had to grieve Peter’s absence. Ned had never felt the loss of his best friend. When Peter had returned, there had been no emotional outpouring of love and relief to match his own.

It was a good thing, really, he told himself. He didn’t want them to have had to grieve his absence the way he had grieved theirs — the way Tony had grieved his.

It was just…lonely.

He had not been alone for long in the other world — the lost souls of the team had found one another eventually, drawn together like magnets — but it had been long enough. Long enough that when Barnes and Sam had found him huddled in on himself on the strange landscape, Peter had wondered whether their familiar faces weren’t simply his mind’s attempt to manufacture a more reassuring reality.

They had all seemed so __calm,__ so unaffected by the hand fate had dealt them. It was a stark contrast to the hot, swirling mess of emotion that felt as though it was permanently lodged between Peter’s ribs. He had struggled to emulate the example they set, but quickly found that he wasn’t built for that sort of indifference, pretend or otherwise.

When the unsettling ripple of time had rent the atmosphere and Strange’s expression had lit up in triumph — when Peter had felt himself torn apart and re-materializing for a second time, gasping for air and shaking apart — he had opened his eyes to find Tony looking older and more terrified than Peter had ever seen him, the man’s broken and bloody lips forming frantic words he couldn’t hear over the deafening roar of _relief_ in his ears.

Every vestige of calm had fallen away from Peter like dust, and he had let himself dissolve into the panicked, guttural sobs he'd been suppressing for what felt like years. But it had been all right — it was all okay, because Tony’s hands were trembling violently against Peter’s back, and his mentor’s tears were hot against his temple and sure, they were both damaged and broken but finally, __finally__ , they were real, he was _real._

It was a memory Peter had held on to lately. Nothing much had felt real since.

 

\------------------

 

It had started with leaving his bedroom light on at night, before he went to sleep.

Their apartment was small enough that May must have noticed, but she hadn’t asked. Peter had told himself that he wasn’t disappointed by this oversight.

It was just that when his world was light, it was easier to pretend that it would never go dark again; he would never have to relive the suffocating darkness that had made his hair stand on end as it had reached up to drag him under. He could close his eyes knowing that when he opened them, the light would still be there.

For a while, that had been enough.

But then it wasn’t.

He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but everything felt… _off._  

He spent his days at school with Ned, who was eager to convince Peter to help him repair a broken Xbox he’d salvaged from a dumpster dive. On the evenings when May was off work, he ate the Chinese carry-out she ordered and listened to her rattle off their latest lucky numbers from the complimentary fortune cookies. And when night came, he shut himself in his bedroom, switched on the light and tried to convince himself that he’d still be alive and home when morning came.

When Uncle Ben had been killed, Peter had wanted nothing more than to sleep. He had spent every waking moment waiting patiently for the sun to set, and had fallen asleep each night with the desperate hope that he would awake the following morning to find that it had all been a nightmare; that he would come into the kitchen and find his uncle sipping his coffee and laughing at the messy state of Peter’s hair as though nothing had ever been wrong. He’d prayed and bargained and begged for one more chance — had sworn that if only the God that Uncle Ben had believed in so fiercely would bring him back, then Peter would be a better nephew, and would never breathe a word to anyone of the terrible things that had come before.

It felt a little like that.

Eventually, he stopped sleeping altogether.

 

\------------------

 

Two weeks after his return home, his phone erupted in the klaxon horn that was Tony’s designated ringtone.

Peter, who had been staring uncomprehendingly at the line of homework equations across his computer screen, fumbled to accept the call.

“Mr. Stark! Hey, man! This, um, this is Peter, by the way.”

“I called _you_ , kid,” Tony’s voice was dry, but Peter could almost picture the smile that accompanied it.

“Yeah — oh, right, sorry — ha ha — so, um, how’s it going?” He stammered, hating the way his voice had risen an octave with embarrassment.

“Oh, you know. The _yooj._ Pep tells me that’s kid-slang for _usual_. But she sort of winked when she said it, so don’t tell me if it isn’t. That’s not a betrayal I can handle. She’s already made me sign the pre-nup.”

Peter realized his face had broken into the first genuine smile he’d felt in days. His shoulders relaxed slightly and a tension he’d been unaware of seemed to melt away as Tony filled the airspace with his usual repartee. Peter interspersed his silences with what he hoped were socially acceptable replies; a hum of acknowledgement here, a quick laugh there. He hadn’t noticed himself dozing off until Tony’s voice became sharp with concern.

“Kid? You still with me?”

“Yeah! Totally still — still here. Sorry. Haven’t gotten much sleep lately, just — lots of um, lots of homework. Tests. Y’know. School.”

“Right,” Tony’s voice was dry again. “Listen, kid, we need to talk.”

Peter was instantly alert.

“Talk? Like — um, in person? D’you want me to come to the compound? Or I mean, I could call an Uber, or — Mr. Stark, am I in trouble?” His voice had risen again despite his best efforts.

“Big trouble, kid. Big. _So-o-o-o_ big. Imagine the Hulk, and then picture the trouble you’re in just, totally wiping the floor with him. So. That’s the size we’re talking.”

A beat passed.

“You’re kidding?”

“I’m kidding, yes, good catch. But we do need to talk. Happy’s downstairs. Are you wearing pants?”

Peter checked automatically, then flushed red.

“Of course I’m — Mr. Stark, it’s the middle of the day!”

His bedroom door creaked open. Tony stood in the doorway for a moment, one hand over his face as he peered at Peter from between the cracks of his fingers.

“Last chance to change your story, kid. I’m gonna lower my hand in five seconds, so if you’re not decent—”

Peter dropped his phone to his mattress and sprang to his feet. Almost before he realized what he was doing he had bounded towards the doorway and wrapped the older man into a crushing embrace. He had only a moment’s pause to feel embarrassed at his own enthusiasm before Tony returned the hug with interest, his arms wrapping tightly around Peter’s shoulders as he let the call drop.

“Hey, Pete.” Mr. Stark’s voice was a low rumble, and this time Peter could feel the accompanying smile against his hairline.

“Hey. Sorry. Just…” Peter began to pull back, suddenly aware of the childishness of his greeting, but Tony held on tight. “Um— it’s just really good to see you, Mr. Stark.”

“Yeah. Not done hugging yet. Give it a little longer, kid. You gotta read the room.”

Peter laughed and allowed himself to lean in, his forehead dropping to the man’s chest as he let out a shuddering breath into his mentor's collar. Beneath Tony's jacket, he could feel the cold press of the detachable arc reactor which housed the nanotech Iron Man suit. He wondered suddenly whether Tony had spent the past two weeks with it hidden beneath his jacket — whether he had felt the way Peter had felt, braced for the next impending disaster that must surely be coming. The thought of it made him hold on a little tighter.

At length, Tony scrubbed a playful hand through Peter’s hair and gave him a final tight squeeze before drawing back to get a better look at him, his hands settling on Peter’s shoulders.

“You don’t look so good, kid.”

 Peter hadn’t been expecting that. He ran a hand instinctively through the hair Tony had mussed out of place, patting it down as though it was the sole source of his dishevelment

 “I, uh, I didn’t have any big plans or anything for today, so I’ve just been — I didn’t really dress up, or —”

 “Yeah. That’s not what I meant. C’mon, Happy’s waiting for us outside. Let’s go for a drive.”

 

\------------------

 

From the driver’s seat of the waiting sedan, Happy lowered the privacy barrier long enough to greet Peter with more warmth than the teenager might have expected, but which he returned with enthusiasm.

“Good to see you, Parker. How you been?”

“Yeah! Um, good! You look — you look like you’ve been good! I mean, not in a weird way—”

Tony made a shooing gesture that earned an eye roll from his head of security and the privacy barrier was raised to its original position.

As the car began to move, his mentor’s arm settled comfortably between the back of Peter’s neck and the headrest. He was reminded irresistibly of his first night back on Earth, when the entire team had huddled together as though any one of them might disappear the moment they broke contact. It had settled his nerves and grounded him in reality, and he was startled to realize how much he’d missed that feeling.

He was fairly sure he was much too old to need this sort of reassurance. If his classmates ever caught wind of his tendency to cling to the nearest available superhero… the resulting humiliation would almost certainly be fatal. And the last time he’d tried to hug Tony in the back of a vehicle he’d been gently rebuffed. But the car’s windows were tinted, and no one would see him, and God, he was tired…

Throwing caution to the wind, Peter slid back across the leather seat and crowded in against Tony’s side. Far from pushing him away, his mentor simply adjusted his arm so that it tucked around Peter’s shoulders. The thrumming buzz of anxiety in Peter’s chest softened to a low hum, and his eyelids drooped.

“You haven’t been sleeping.” Tony remarked without looking at him.

Peter didn’t see the point in denying it.

“No. I haven’t — it’s just — I’ve got a lot on my mind at night, with y’know, stopping criminals and um… So I, uh, I try to sleep during the day, but there’s, y’know, school. And I figured I’d catch up on sleep when the weekend came, but there’s finals coming up, and I’ve gotta be ready. For, um. For that.” He knew he was rambling, but Tony’s heartbeat was strong and steady against his ear, and there was something hypnotic about its dependable rhythm.

“You forget I get a read-out of your activity when you’re in the suit, you little fibber. You haven’t been out Spider-Manning at night since you’ve been back.” Tony hesitated a moment, and then continued, “And your aunt says you leave your bedroom light on all night.”

Peter’s exhaustion was briefly interrupted by indignation.

“You’ve got my __own aunt__  spying on me?”

Tony snorted and lifted his free hand to flick Peter in the ear.

“Please. I don’t need Aunt Hottie to be my eyes and ears. We just have a very mature, adult, co-parenting plan in place for this sort of thing. We communicate. Just because we’re not together anymore doesn’t mean we don’t both still love you—”

Peter shot Tony a look. The corner of the man’s mouth twitched upward.

“We gotta work on your sense of humor, kid. Anyway, she shot me a text, I checked your suit data, and __all__ of us agree something’s up.”

Peter averted his eyes.

This wasn’t something he wanted to discuss — not when his defenses were down from lack of sleep and he might let slip more than he intended. It wasn’t even something he’d acknowledged to __himself,__  if he was being honest.

Tony seemed to read something in Peter’s lack of response; the arm around his shoulders squeezed him slightly closer and he let the subject drop.

“I got the all-clear from May to let you spend the weekend at the compound — that’s where we’re headed. We’ll talk more when we get there if the rest of the team doesn’t snatch you out from under me. Barnes hasn’t shut up about you since you left; I think he and Cap are considering petitioning the court for custody. Get some sleep, Spidey. We’ve got a long drive ahead of us.”

Peter let out a grateful sigh and dropped his head back onto Tony’s shoulder, content to postpone the conversation for the time being. Despite the tinted windows, he could feel the sun’s rays cutting through the dim interior of the car when he closed his eyes, and Tony’s shoulder was warm and reassuring beneath his cheek.

He had died. It had been real and it had been terrifying, but he was __here__  now, and this was real too.

He was almost positive.

He let himself sleep.

 

\------------------

 

When Peter awoke, the sunlight outside the car had disappeared, but someone had switched on an interior light.

Beside him, Tony had apparently dozed off.

For all the grief Tony had given Peter for his recent insomnia, it was clear the man hadn’t been sleeping well himself; now that he was able to get a good look at him, Peter could see heavy bags beneath his mentor’s eyes and a certain pallor to his skin.

He was surprised to find how much the sight hurt him.

As though he had sensed Peter’s eyes on him, Tony stirred. He scrubbed a hand across his face and fixed Peter with a wry half-smile, reaching out to tuck the boy’s head back against his shoulder.

“You’re supposed to be catching up on sleep, kid. How long you been up?”

“Not long.” Peter murmured, pressing his cheek back into the man’s suit jacket. “Hey, Mr. Stark?”

“It’s _Tony_ , kid. What is it?”

"You, uh. You don’t look so good, either.”

Peter angled his head slightly upward to meet Tony’s blunt stare, which he might once have found intimidating. But it was hard to be intimidated by a man who had spent most of a long car journey acting as a human pillow.

Tony must have had a similar thought, because his expression cracked into a smile and the hand that threaded through Peter’s hair told him there were no hard feelings.

“Yeah. Well. At least I’ve got hair on my peaches, you little shit.”

Peter snorted — it was an obvious deflection, but the conversation had strayed a little too close to emotional territory for both of them, and he was almost grateful for it.

There was a soft whirring sound as the privacy barrier lowered and Happy met his boss’s gaze in the rear view mirror.

“Rolling up in ten, Tony. Might want to send Pep a made-it-home-safe text. I don’t want a repeat of last time.”

Tony rolled his eyes in response to Peter’s inquisitive glance.

“Happy’s a little over-involved. FRI, text Pepper —”

“One step ahead of you, Boss,” F.R.I.D.A.Y.’s cool voice intoned from the speaker system, and Peter almost jumped.

Tony gave the back of his neck a bracing squeeze.

“Ten minutes to snooze, kid. Make ‘em count.”

And to Peter’s surprise, he did.

 

\------------------

 

Whatever dire warnings Tony had given about the compound’s other residents coming to abduct him, Peter was shepherded into the facility uninterrupted. Inside, the lights were dimmed to reflect the late hour — over four hours of driving had put their arrival well into the evening, and Peter guessed the rest of the team must have retreated to their private quarters.

They'd made quick work of the dinner feast they’d found waiting for them in the common kitchen (Clint, according to Tony, was a surprisingly good cook) and had just as quickly headed for the plush and spacious room which everyone referred to as “The Den.”

The Den had the distinction of being the only room in the compound without a single screen to distract its occupants from their conversation. Peter thought he knew a trap when he saw one, but could think of no plausible reason to insist they talk elsewhere, so he allowed himself to be led in.

Sure enough, Tony began speaking the moment they had settled in on the sofa closest to the electric fireplace.

“So.”

Peter nodded. “So.”

They looked at each other, and Peter was immediately compelled to look away. He busied himself with twisting the hem of his hoodie between his fingers.

Tony exhaled a measured breath and from the corner of his eye, Peter saw him run a frustrated hand through his own hair.

“Look, kid. My father was shit at this sort of thing. And maybe I’m—” he faltered and seemed to catch himself, “I’m not saying I’m like your—”

“No. I mean, you can, um, you could say that,” Peter blurted out without thinking, and immediately glanced back down at his knees. “If — I mean, if you wanted to.”

“Yeah?”

Tony sounded genuinely startled.

Peter said nothing, but glanced up at him long enough to nod. It suddenly felt like the bravest thing he’d ever done, and although he half expected another of Tony’s wise-crack deflections in response, the prospect of rejection was terrifying.

Still. Too late to take it back now.

And he didn’t really want to take it back at all.

For a while, neither of them said anything. When he chanced a glance over, Peter saw that Tony had buried his face in his hands.

“I know I haven’t always been the best — best role-model, or best mentor, or best anything. I don’t know if you’ve noticed this about me, Pete, but I don’t always do the right thing. I think I’ve gotten better. Rhodey says I’ve gotten better. But this is all — this is uncharted water for me, kiddo, you know what I mean?”

Peter nodded. It was the best he could do.

“No, you don’t. I don’t even know what I mean.” Tony dug his knuckles into his eyebrows and exhaled sharply, clearly at a loss. “I just — these past two weeks have been no good. They’ve been no good for any of us. Thor barely says a word to anyone, Bruce listens to these guided meditation tapes for __hours on end,__ Clint is afraid to step foot anywhere _near_ his family, and I —” another pause, this one punctuated by a swallow, “I should’ve called you sooner.”

Peter chanced another glance up. He wasn’t pleased to hear that he hadn’t been the only one struggling since his return. But maybe the heavy feeling of loneliness he’d carried felt a little bit lighter. He cleared his throat around the lump of emotion that had settled there.

“No, that’s — that’s okay. You’ve had a lot on your plate with the Accords, and the wedding and everything. I didn’t want to get in your way.”

“You’re not in the way, Pete.” Tony cut in, his voice sharp. “Not to me. Not ever. You understand?”

Peter hesitated a moment too long.

Tony turned to face him on the sofa, and without the hands over his face it was easy to see that his eyes were damp and red. His expression was almost angry.

“Look at me, Peter — that’s not what this is, okay? That — that being in the way, that not being able to talk about stuff — that was how I grew up. I don’t want to do that. I don’t want to __be__ that. But I don’t know how this is supposed to work. And I screwed up, and this — this is me trying to do better.”

Peter couldn’t look at him. They were getting dangerously close to a topic he wanted to steer far clear of.

“I need you to tell me what’s been going on in that head of yours, kid,” Tony urged, and his voice was gentle again.

Peter was torn.

"I don’t — I don’t really know how to explain it. I’m not trying to be difficult, I just—” he clenched the worn material of his jeans in both fists, still staring fixedly at his lap. “I don’t know. I just haven’t felt like sleeping.”

He felt strangely exposed, sitting there staring at nothing while Tony stared at him. He wished his mentor would look away.

“You afraid of the dark?” Tony ventured, giving his ribs a gentle nudge. “Because listen, I’m prepared to buy out every night light factory on the east coast if you think it’ll help. I can work with that.”

Peter’s brow furrowed in reply.

“It’s not the dark. I mean, the light thing — I guess I just—” He slumped deeper into his seat with a noise of frustration.

Tony raised a placatory hand and quickly changed tack.

“Okay. Let’s try something else." The engineer lifted his gaze to the ceiling and propped his ankles up on the adjoining coffee table, waving a vague hand in the space between them as though to preemptively ward away any protest to his next suggestion.

"Let's try this. This is some deep-dive psycho-shit Bruce taught me, so there’s bound to be some science behind it. He calls it ‘stream of consciousness.’ You just start talking. You say whatever comes to mind without censoring yourself.”

Peter cast him a dubious look.

“I don’t think I can pull that off, Mr. Sta — uh, Tony.”

“Give it a shot, kid. I seem to remember you were a regular motor-mouth before Thanos. Just start talking and see how it goes. Close your eyes if it helps.”

Peter closed his eyes. Almost immediately, the fear that always loomed somewhere deep in his gut began to rise. He struggled to remember the point of this exercise. “What — um, what should I talk about?”

“Tell me why you haven’t been sleeping,” Tony suggested, and just the sound of his voice so nearby was enough to slow the frantic beat of Peter’s heart. But not for long.

With his eyes closed, Peter was suddenly afraid that if he let the silence go on for much longer he might do something as terminally embarrassing as cry. Instead, he began to speak.

“Okay. It's just. I'm so glad to be back. I really am, but it's like..." Peter began, but the words remained lodged in his throat.

"Keep going, kid. Don't think."

Peter tried again. And once he got going, it was hard to stop.

"It’s just that nobody knows what happened to me. To us. Or, or even to _them_ , because some of them must have died, too. So they’re all just going about their lives. But I was gone for a whole year, and I didn’t see any of them and I thought I might never see them again. And I was just — just _existing_ somewhere away from everyone I loved. And I thought maybe — maybe it would be like that forever, and I’d just be alone for eternity in some other world. And I always thought I’d get to see my parents when I died, and my Uncle Ben, but — but they weren’t there. So I — I pretended I was back home, and everything was back to normal. And I think maybe I’m still pretending. I think if I go to sleep long enough I’ll wake up for _real_ , and I’ll still be — I’ll still be gone. Because none of this is _right._ ”

“What’s not right?”

Peter had been so carried away in his own words that he’d almost forgotten that Tony was listening. He forced himself to keep his eyes closed as he continued:

“ _Everything_. Everyone is happy and no one died and — that’s not the way things are. Life doesn’t work that way. People leave you and they don’t come back. They — they die, or they get tired of you, and you never see them again. And it happens _all the time,_ but it hasn’t happened lately, so it’s — I mean, what’s more likely? That a team of superheroes brought me back from the dead by _time-travelling_? That my — my _hero_  showed up in Queens just to check on me? Or that none of this is real? So I’ll — you know — eventually I’ll wake up and it’ll be over. It’ll just be me again. No parents, no aunt or uncle, no Iron Man, no _suit_ , just — that’s how it ends. But I — I don’t want to g-go. I don’t want to go back there. I don’t want to be alone again. I don’t — I can’t—”

He couldn’t breathe. He opened his eyes but the edges of his vision were going black and there was a roaring in his ears and his heart was beating so fast that it was going to shatter his ribs and burst right out of his chest.

“Okay. My fault — you’re okay, Pete. You’re still here,” Tony shuffled sideways until they were pressed shoulder to shoulder, and Peter fumbled with numb fingers for something to hold onto; he found Tony’s forearm as the man’s arm settled around his back and held on tight. He couldn't _breathe._

“Mr. Stark — think ‘m gonna pass out—” He gasped, shifting his grip until he felt the man's fingers close around his own.

“You’re okay. Just a panic attack, Pete. I've got you, kid. You’re safe. It’ll pass.” Tony’s voice was low and reassuring, but there was something pained lying just under the surface that Peter couldn’t quite process through the flood of adrenaline in his veins.

“I’m scared.” He hadn't meant to say it, and his voice sounded hatefully small, even to his own ears. He turned his face into the man's jacket until the cool blue light of the arc reactor was all that he could see.

Tony’s arm around his back tightened so fiercely it was almost painful.

“Don’t be.”

 

\------------------

 

Peter woke the following morning to the sensation of soft, buttery morning light against his eyelids, and knew immediately that he would not be faced with the barren landscape of the soul stone when he opened them. He kept them closed all the same.

His head was pillowed against something soft and warm, and let himself nudge in closer before the hazy fog of sleep could lift and restore his usual self-consciousness. God, he’d been so tired…he was _still_ so tired.

He hadn’t noticed the steady weight wrapped around him until it lifted, and he made a muffled noise of complaint before he could stop himself. There was a snort of suppressed laughter against his ear and the absent weight was replaced with the heavenly sensation of someone scratching his back.

“Let’s get you up, kid. We gotta move you to a real bed before the rest of the Justice Ducks wake up and realize you’re here.”

Peter wanted nothing more than to drift back off to sleep where he sat, consequences be damned. But he allowed Tony to help him to his feet and steer him off in the direction of the compound’s private suites. He knew the corridor well enough to know that his own quarters were behind the first door on the left, and was surprised when they passed it without stopping.

“Wasn’t that…?”

“Uh huh. We’re headed somewhere quieter.”

Tony led him to the end of the corridor and raised his palm to a discreet panel of wall beside the door. There was a soft mechanical _click_ , and the door swung open to reveal what could only be Tony Stark’s suite; the room was so outrageously lavish that Peter suspected it must have been a kind of ironic statement on his mentor’s part.

The man himself gave Peter a gentle push between the shoulder blades, pointing in the direction of the four-poster bed.

“There you go, kid. Best seat in the house and no super-soldiers creeping up on you while you sleep.”

Peter sat heavily on the edge of the (really _ridiculously_  comfortable) bed, torn between embarrassment and overwhelming gratitude at the care he had been shown. He had barely begun to toe off his shoes when he noticed his mentor heading back for the door, and a shot of panic rippled through him. His hands were suddenly trembling. He gripped his right hand in his left and squeezed until his fingernails left indentations along his knuckles and the trembling stopped.

“Wait! This — this is great, Mr. Stark. Really. But I’m not really tired anymore. I think I’ll just—” His protest was interrupted by an irrepressible yawn, which he suffered through as quickly as possible before rushing to finish, “—um, I’ll catch up with the rest of the team, you know? Find out what they’ve been up to and — that sort of thing.”

Tony had paused on his way the door and received Peter’s performance with remarkable good grace; he didn’t even crack a smile at the yawn, though the corners of his eyes twitched suspiciously upward. Peter met his gaze with what he hoped was a convincingly earnest smile and waited for a nod of approval,

Instead, the man shucked off his own shoes and settled in beside Peter on the bed.

“Well, maybe we’ll just have our own catch-up session first. A catch-up pre-game. Catch-Up: Episode One.” He bumped his shoulder into Peter’s. Peter flushed.

 “You uh — you don’t have to —” he stammered, but he leaned into the contact despite himself.

“You know, this is actually good timing. Kind of fortuitous, in a way. Because you fell asleep on me last night before I could force you to listen to __my__ stream of consciousness, which, really — bad form, Parker. You’re lucky I love you, kid, or that kind of impertinence _really_ wouldn’t fly. But now I get to make it up to you.”

Peter was swept along under Tony’s arm and settled back against the pillows without a word of protest, his mind too busy processing the all-too-casual _you’re lucky I love you, kid_  to remember he’d decided against another attempt at sleep.

“So. That thing you said last night — that bit about everyone leaving you — just a few quick notes." Tony's eyes were fixed on the top of the four-poster, and his voice lost some of its usual arrogant bravado. "You should know — it would take more than a nightmare to get rid of me. The entire _planet_ could be coming for you with torches and pitchforks, and I’d still be on Team Spider-Man. Okay? You could have your Aunt May and half of Congress webbed up to the dome of the United States Capitol while waving a ‘Hail Hydra!’ flag and I’d still be behind you. I mean, I’d be behind you with a fake ID and a passport to smuggle you out of the country, but still — you get the picture.”

Instead of the playful nudge he'd expected, Tony's thumb traced soothingly along the shallow indentations on the back of Peter's right hand, and he tugged him a little closer.

Peter couldn’t speak. The tears he had managed to fight back the night before were threatening to force their way out.

“Hey — look at me, kid,” Tony’s voice was so unexpectedly gentle that Peter obeyed without thinking. The billionaire’s expression was deadly serious. “You trust me, right?”

Peter swallowed hard. “Right.”

“Then listen up: I’m not going anywhere. Not ever. That doesn’t change. Even if you wake up back in another dimension with no one but the Goons of the Galaxy to keep you company. I’ll still be on my way to you.” Tony chucked him under the chin. “Got it?”

Peter nodded around the tightness in his throat, but managed to croak out an answer at Tony’s expectant stare.

 “Got it.”

The man brushed a hand through Peter’s hair so fleetingly that he might have imagined it, but he closed his eyes at the affectionate gesture all the same.

In the next instant, Tony had given his shoulders a friendly shake and pointedly stretched out to make himself comfortable, shifting unnecessarily atop the covers long enough to give Peter a chance to discreetly dry his eyes.

“Good. That’s enough of that. We’ve got a whole weekend ahead of us to get absolutely nothing done. Can’t go into that kind of excitement unrested. F.R.I.D.A.Y., lights — ah, second thought. Leave them on. We’ll just —”

Peter let his head drop back to the crook of Tony’s arm. He pressed in closer until he could feel his own heartbeat slow to match the steady pulse against his temple. He steeled himself.

“No — it’s okay. I don’t mind.”

He felt his mentor’s smile against the top of his head.

“You heard the kid, F.R.I.D.A.Y. Lights out.”

**Author's Note:**

> I didn't intend for this to become a SERIES of self-indulgent, fluffy cuddle trash fics, but here we are. I hope you enjoyed this one all the same! Title comes from the old Irish lullaby "All Through the Night."


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